FVD is now increasingly associating itself with right-wing extremists, racists and misogynists; De Vos speaks at ‘remigration summit’ in Porto

On a sunny day in May last year, the two prominent FVD members Massimo Etalle and Freek Jansen tried to enter the Vittorio Gassman theater in the Italian town of Gallarate, wearing a bit of disguise, when they were spotted by an Italian camera crew.

They are – both in suits and ties – on their way to the so-called ‘remigration summit’, a meeting of extreme right-wing activists and politicians. Plans are being discussed for the departure of millions of people with a migration background from Europe. The controversial meeting was initially scheduled to take place in Milan, but due to intervention by the mayor, the conference attendees had to move to a small town near Milan.

The summit was organized by, among others, the Austrian activist Martin Sellner, former neo-Nazi and leader of the international Identitarian Movement. The two prominent FVD members – Jansen is a Member of Parliament and founder of the JFVD youth branch, Etalle is a councilor in The Hague and the partner of current faction leader Lidewij de Vos – did not announce in advance that they would attend the meeting. Seeking connections with extremists like Sellner – whose organization is in the Netherlands tyres maintains discussions with the extreme right-wing Outpost – is not something that FVD is doing openly at that time.

At the location of the conference the participants are waited for by camera crews. Etalle puts his hand in front of his face when they try to film him. Jansen is wearing sunglasses, smoking a cigarette and stops for a moment when one of the journalists speaks to him. „You are too elegant to be a little racist, guys” says the reporter with a thick Italian accent. “Thank you very much”, Jansen answers, before he and Etalle quickly walk on.

Invisible to the outside world, the prominent FVD members in the theater meet not only foreign right-wing extremists, but also members of extreme right-wing Dutch groups such as Voorpost and Pegida, and Thomas D. of the Geuzenbond. This twenty-something was sentenced to two years in prison last February convicted due to prohibited possession of weapons.

Legitimation of the extreme right

A year later the situation is very different. FVD was one of the big winners in the municipal elections last spring, with several people on the electoral lists coming from extreme right-wing groups. In a heated debate in the House of Representatives about violent asylum protests, De Vos said last Tuesday that Dutch people are “people who originally come from here.” While the controversial meeting in Milan was still closed last year, the press is also welcome in Porto next weekend.

It fits in with the strategy to mainstream far-right ideology and normalize ties with previously extreme figures. Pretend that these are normal movements that organize a normal conference. And when the press and politicians from Europe come to this event, the extreme right-wing ideology becomes more legitimized.

And so the arrival of FVD faction leader Lidewij de Vos as a speaker is openly announced prior to the second ‘remigration summit’ to be held in Portugal this weekend. “She won the elections in the Netherlands with her remigration message and continues to rise in the polls,” the organization said on the social media channels of ‘Resum26’. For example, De Vos and FVD are now affiliated at the highest level with a collection of European and American right-wing extremists, convicted racists and open misogynists. Other extreme political parties such as the Spanish Vox and the German AfD send lower political representatives.

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In collaboration with other European media in the research collective EIC NRC investigated the organizers of the event in Porto. The main organizer is the Portuguese Afonso Gonçalves of the far-right action group Reconquista, or ‘reconquest’. He is known for his misogynistic statements. For example, he said in a podcast in 2024 that women are less intelligent than men and only men should have the right to vote. Ninety percent of women have an account on social media labels him as “whores.”

In addition, Gonçalves makes no secret of his rejection of parliamentary democracy. In the podcast he said he was in favor of an “authoritarian aristocracy”, in which power lies with a wealthy elite and citizens have little say. There is a judicial investigation into Gonçalves in Portugal for ‘hate crimes’, including in 2023 when he disrupted a Pride event.

The Portuguese has in common with the other organizers of the meeting in Porto that Gonçalves is being investigated by the judiciary. For example, the Italian Andrea Ballarati, once active in Fratelli d’Italia, the political party of Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni. He left the party and founded the far-right movement Azione Cultura Tradizione. Ballarati is also now being prosecuted by Italian justice. From his criminal file, true NRC had access to, it appears that the case mainly revolves around hateful videos on Instagram. Ballarati called on “real Italians” to “take a side” and “react and fight” against advancing immigration.

Yet another organizer, the Belgian Dries Van Langenhove, was reinstated this week convictedthis time by a court in Leuven. The reason was statements during a lecture at the Catholic University of Leuven in 2024. The theme was ‘regenerative agriculture’, but according to the court, the speech by the founder of the far-right Flemish youth movement Schild & Vrienden quickly resulted in a monologue in which he spread ideas based on racial hatred. Van Langenhove was fined 4,000 euros. Last year he was convicted by the highest Belgian court for racism and trivializing the Holocaust.

Van Langenhove has long been closely associated with Forum for Democracy. During the FVD Summer School in 2018 in Sterkenburg Castle – about ‘immigration, integration and remigration’ – Van Langenhove was Freek Jansen’s roommate. There is a crowdfunding campaign on the Forum website to provide for the legal costs of party friend Van Langenhove. In a podcast prior to the first remigration summit near Milan, the Belgian used the terms “remigration” and “deportation” interchangeably. Remigration would be the “soft approach” and “the friendly option”.

Comments from other organizers of the conference in Porto also show that ‘remigration’ is a euphemism for ‘forced deportation’. “Remigration is the only solution. We can talk about the scale and speed. But the measure itself is not up for discussion,” Martin Sellner posted on X this month. He also wrote that “passport Europeans”, by which he means European citizens with a migration background, are “not Europeans”.

The leadership of the far-right youth movement Junge Tat – which uses a rune from the Germanic runic alphabet as its logo – comes to Portugal from Switzerland. This duo, Tobias Lingg and Manuel Corchia, is currently being prosecuted by the Swiss justice system for discrimination and incitement to hatred. The two have been before convicted because of racial discrimination, vandalism and gun ownership.

Traditional gender roles

The fact that FVD no longer has a problem with being openly associated with increasingly extreme figures is also evident from the other participants. For example, the far-right American nationalist and racist Jared Taylor announced via Instagram in early May that he was also traveling to Porto.

In 2017, Thierry Baudet wanted to have a secret dinner with Taylor, who openly advocates racial purity, not to confirm. That was also the time that FVD was a member of the Dutch People’s Union (NVU) from the party putbecause it did not want to be associated with this neo-Nazi club at the time. Nowadays posing Second MPs of Forum openly with NVU leader Constant Kusters and is a former NVU member of the municipal council on behalf of Forum in Nieuwegein.

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With the delegation of faction leader De Vos to Porto, Forum is even more emphatically opting for an extreme right-wing course. “This once again shows that Forum is an openly extreme right-wing party,” says Léonie de Jonge, professor of right-wing extremism research at the University of Tübingen.

According to De Jonge, the aim of the summit in Porto is to normalize the conversation about ‘remigration’ and to also conduct this debate in the ‘mainstream media’. “They want to show: look, we can do this in public nowadays and just invite the mainstream press,” she says.

Regarding the anti-women comments of main organizer Gonçalves, De Jonge says that Lidewij de Vos may not literally support them. “But the party certainly supports the idea of ​​the dominant man and the subordinate woman who fulfills traditional role patterns,” says De Jonge.

NRC De Vos asked whether she has no problem speaking at a conference where the main organizer makes anti-women statements. “I do not feel the need to justify myself to NRC about who I talk to and about which other guests are present at events where I speak,” De Vos writes in her answer. “We will be present at this conference because we consider remigration to be at the core of our political convictions.”

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